What You Should 'REALLY' Focus on When Creating Grooves (L#110)

One of the questions I repeatedly get asked is “what exactly are you thinking while playing the bass?”… and I get it! It was the one thing that bugged me forever when I was younger… what the heck are all these awesome bass players thinking while they’re grooving and soloing?!

It drove me nuts, lol!

After a lot of years in the shed, thousands of hours transcribing and a fair amount of pizza eating I finally figured it out. Well, don’t get me wrong it didn’t come to me in a flash of lightening, but I got there in the end ;)

What these top players are doing, is thinking in layers. They’re playing bass like you would build a house, they lay a strong foundation and then build the rest of the structure on top of those foundations. The gag is, with so much information out there and the fact that many people are confused with what the bass actually should be doing as an instrument within a band - as in how it should be functioning - i.e. outlining the chords (don’t worry I get deep into this in the lesson)… it’s led to an army… in fact, a legion of confused bass players.

Hopefully this lesson will pull you back on track and possibly change the way you think of playing the bass.

In this lesson I’m going to cover 3 things…

1. Show you a seriously bad ass groove! 2. Discuss exactly what i’m thinking while playing bass and why. 3. Show you how you can get these things into your own playing, and how to approach it.

If you’re new to Scott’s Bass Lessons you should also check out the member only backstage area as there’s a ton of cool bass goodies in there you’re gonna want to get your hands on. Oh, and it’s free! ;) ... check it out here after the lesson.

As always, see you in the shed.

Scott.